Sweet Valley Confidential

The Wakefield twins are back! And yes, I'm excited. The Sweet Valley series were one of my favorites growing up. And now they're coming out with a prologue. Sweet Valley Confidential: Ten Years Later... is due to hit shelves in March 2011, and I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm totally going to buy one!

These books have a soft spot in my heart. I collected and read the Sweet Valley Twins while in grade school; and then graduated to the more "mature" Sweet Valley High series when I entered middle school. I had a huge collection of the pastel colored books. I remember taking such great care of them, as I did with all my books -- relishing every word and carefully handling the covers so as not to break the paper binding or wrinkle the pages. I wish I had saved them not just so my daughter could also one day enjoy the stories, but also because I think there was a bit of an art to the way they illustrated the covers. I could get into a whole spiel of how cover art for young reader books have changed so much over the years, but I won't.

Instead, I'll leave you with an excerpt of Chapter One from the new book. It's a bit grittier and definitely more adult in nature (umm, Elizabeth Wakefield crying after an orgasm?? Whuaaattt??) than the Sweet Valley stories I remember, which begs the question: Who exactly is the intended audience for this book? Current young readers? Or old, sentimental fogies like me? Or maybe today's young reader is more advanced in terms of subject matter? Eh, who knows.